There are so many genres and so little time! I find that I like to read a variety of books. The most recent book I've completed is A Rancher's Woman by E. Ayers. Can I say that it was really, really good! Like, it made me cry. Twice. That's a mark of a great book, in my opinion. I will say that E.'s writing style is different than mine, but what she does she does very well.

I enjoyed the fact that there wasn't a lot of steamy sex scenes for the sake of steamy sex scenes. I enjoyed that history she employed to make the book jump off the pages. (I had no idea that people had indoor plumbing and running water during the time her book is set. Maybe in the big cities, but she really dug into her research and taught me a thing or two.) I enjoyed the way the main character's played off each other, and I loved the true-to-life emotions, lack of emotions, fear of emotions and emotional volleying that each character exhibited - basically making them into "real people." (You can find A Rancher's Woman on Kindle here.) A Rancher's Woman is a historical fiction novel with a nice helping of romance, definitely on the sweeter side and well worth a read.

Prior to reading E. Ayer's novel, I read Language of Hoofbeats by Catherine Ryan Hyde (Pay it Forward.) This was not a romance (which is my go-to genre for the most part) but a literary fiction novel that centered around one-half of a lesbian couple and their neighbor across the street. Each of the women had some issues (one of them being the fact that a lesbian couple with kids just moved in across the street, oh my!) and each of them had crosses to bear. The author handled everything with grace and a literary talent I can only hope to grow into one day. I recommend this book, as well, and I found it in paperback in Wal-Mart very recently. If you prefer Kindle, you can find it here.

Both of these novels are mainstream fiction. I tend to write almost exclusively in the romance genre, but my current work-in-progress is more of a literary fiction endeavor. So, I'll be reading more litfic, and anything leslit I can find for the next few months. I'll keep ya'll posted here on Mainstream Mondays.

So what genre do you like to read? Do you have a favorite author I should check out? What defines a mainstream title for you?

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Author

Amazon Best Selling Author Marjorie Jones is an accomplished romance novelist and professional writer. Born in Rhode Island to a Naval Aviator and a proud Homemaker, she currently resides in Utah with her wife, Becky, and the last of their shared seven children; the twins, Thing One and Thing Squared. The others have all flown the coop.

In 2006, Marjorie received the Isolde Carlsen Award For Excellence in Writing and the Utah/Salt Lake Chapter of Romance Writers of America named her the 2005 Utah Writer of the Year. Romantic Times Book Reviews Magazine nominated her novels The Lighthorseman and The Flyer for Reviewers Choice Awards. Both of these novels received 4.5 Star reviews from this distinguished publication.

Her latest release, Loving the Heartland, has garnered praise from readers and reached the position of #1 Best Seller for Lesbian Fiction in the Australian market while maintaining position in the TOP 5 in the US and UK.